


Where I'm Needed

by salazar_kat



Series: Background fics to 'Snacks and Letters' [21]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Gen, None - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-07-05
Updated: 2011-07-05
Packaged: 2017-10-21 01:50:40
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 701
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/219568
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/salazar_kat/pseuds/salazar_kat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Regulus helps Severus with his future plans...shrewdly</p>
            </blockquote>





	Where I'm Needed

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Snacks and Letters](https://archiveofourown.org/works/216898) by [salazar_kat](https://archiveofourown.org/users/salazar_kat/pseuds/salazar_kat), [Sionna_Raven](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sionna_Raven/pseuds/Sionna_Raven). 



Regulus couldn't stand the sound of grinding teeth louder than the crackle of the fire any longer. He knew his closest friend was in a bad mood – a worse temper than usual, if that was possible. Regulus was busy sitting with Avery, toasting Gryffindors (crumpets) in the flames of the common room fire on a spearing fork, but he was always very observant. It was part of being a seeker.

This eye for detail people called his downfall or what would be his saving grace. The two danced in his mind for a minute, and he decided to stand and find out what was making Severus more hunched and twitchy than usual. Their hair was almost identical, but Regulus preened and Severus most certainly did not. This made him less approachable at first, but once you got used to the greasiness, you sort of came to accept it as a part of Snape's personality.

He grabbed the comb in his pocket ironically, and snorted to himself. What was he thinking? The downcast teenager Regulus was approaching was Regulus' best friend. Severus was headed the same direction, and like Regulus, Severus had a few misgivings.

Regulus was sixteen, Severus seventeen. They knew they were approaching their induction into the Death Eaters. Severus turned suddenly in his chair, his eyes slits, which widened into as welcoming a look as they ever had as Regulus approached. Snape was a little intimidating but approachable.

“What's up? Why are you so pissed off?” Regulus crouched beside Snape's chair, passing Severus two Gryffindors. Severus shoved the crumpets away, and muttered, “I have an owl from my parents. They want me to find a place of my own at the end of school instead of returning to Spinner's End. They say – he says – that now I'm of age I can take care of myself, and that all I do is cause him grief and some other nonsense.”

“You can come to my place, for a bit. A few days at least. I know you don't get on with my Mum.” Regulus bit his lip and drummed his fingers nervously on the wooden side of Severus' chair. He moved to a more comfortable sitting position on the floor.

“Not much help, but ... whatever.” Severus pulled up his legs and rested his chin on his knees, grasping his lower legs.

“Write back! Tell them it's your home too! Or make like you need to be eighteen like the Muggles,” Regulus suggested.

“ _I am not a Muggle_. And I don't want to be where I'm not wanted. What's the point? But I'll go back to get the books. They're not holding on to all those books without me Apparating away with a load of them. The best ones, obviously, the useful ones. Then I'll go where I'm needed, somewhere other than school or someone's couch.”

“I'll go with you.” Regulus tried to make a joke of it. Both of the teens knew that Regulus was not likely to abandon the Noble and most Ancient House of Black. Severus turned his head away, his hooked nose lit by the torch on the stone wall to his left. Regulus thought maybe this was the reason Severus was so unloved. His looks and mannerisms. Maybe he was a bit of a grouchy git, but that grouchy git was loyal. Severus looked back at him and smiled a genuine smile.

“I know you'd come if you could. You have family who want you. There's Hogwarts, still. There's always Hogwarts, at least for now.” Severus looked unlike himself, a little contented.

“Maybe when we're branded the Dark Lord will let you teach here. You could come home year after year.” Regulus looked unusually shrewd. “You could plant the seed in his mind, and come and blossom here like a...”

“Venomous Tentacula,” Severus finished, taking Regulus' sharp insight into account, and laughing slightly.

**

Severus stood ten years later outside the Slytherin Common Room, and remembered the advice of a boy who had been killed for his unusual perception. Severus didn't know the details, but he trusted his mind's image of a friend who always did the right thing, even when in the midst of the wrong thing.


End file.
